POUNDSHOP PEP

Mirror football writer pulls no punches as he analyses where it has all gone wrong for the Blues

ARROGANT, outclassed and out of his depth.

Maurizio Sarri isn’t just fighting to save his job because of the impatience of Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich.

He is up against it because his players have lost faith in his ability to compete with the likes of Manchester City and Liverpool.

Because he refuses to accept, as his predecessor Antonio Conte did in his first season, that he needs to adapt if he wants to win something.

Sarri might have already apologised to Chelsea’s supporters, and his side should win at Malmo with the minimum of fuss in the Europa League on Thursday.

But why should Eden Hazard snub Real

Madrid in the summer to commit himself to any more of this chaos?

What incentive is there for Callum Hudson-Odoi, dragged down to Bournemouth and then up to Manchester without being included in the squad for either game, to reject Bayern Munich for a Chelsea team going backwards?

Gonzalo Higuain, who sought sanctuary at Stamford Bridge after a difficult first half of the season at AC Milan, must be wondering what on earth he has done.

Sarri told the Italian press on Sunday night that he was unafraid of the call from Abramovich, “Because I never really speak to him”.

Yet surely you only give it the large one like that if you are a serial winner like Pep Guardiola at Manchester City. In a sea of dominant light blue at the Etihad on Sunday, Sarri looked like a man drowning. A poundshop Pep.

Jody Morris, Chelsea’s former Under-18’s boss – now Frank Lampard’s No.2 at Derby – put it best when he tweeted: “Only positive to take out of that is that it should have been 10.”

So, yes. Sarri trouble. Most self-inflicted. N’Golo Kante is far too is in of it low maintenance a player to complain about being played out of position when he is the best defensive midfielder in Europe.

Yet the sight of the France World Cup winner (below) forlornly foraging further up the pitch while Jorginho is being steamrollered, tells you all you need to know about Sarri’s Chelsea.

It is a club where the likes of Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Andreas Christensen and

Hudson-Odoi struggle to get a look in. A set up where Sarri’s Plan B consists of replacing Ross Barkley with Mateo Kovacic or vice-versa – a substitution that has now been made 19 times this season.

Talk all you want about ‘Sarriball’, the possession-based attacking football that saw Napoli record their best-ever campaign for goals scored and points won last season. Juventus still beat them to the

Serie A title.

Yet, instead of focusing on winning first and artistic impression second, Sarri and his Chelsea bosses are lost in a fantasy.

They want a quick fix with sprinkles on top when they need instead to rebuild from the back. Because in two weeks when they

meet City again in the Carabao Cup final there is nothing to suggest there will be any reversal in fortune whatsoever.

Cesar Azpilicueta (below) will still be having nightmares about Raheem Sterling flying past him.

It leaves Chelsea between a rock and a hard place. Yes, they would look “weak” if they fired their man after less than a season in charge.

On the other hand, Sarri’s side are so inconsistent you simply couldn’t back them to reel in resurgent Manchester United for a top-four place.

That might be enough for Abramovich to pull the trigger at the end of the season.

It might just be that, like Ole Gunner Solskjaer at United, the answer could be an old boy finding his way in management. Someone who embodies the spirit of the club.

Lampard was dismissive of the idea yesterday. But if the call were to come, you can bet he’d be

ready.